A taste of peace after Merdeka
Retired civil servant recalls the years of suffering under Japanese rule
SEREMBAN: Every time Merdeka Day approaches, V. Veeramalai, who has gone through hardship under the Japanese Occupation and seen firsthand the birth of the nation, would feel grateful for living in a free country.
He was only five when he and an older brother were forcefully taken away by Japanese soldiers from their estate in Batu Anam near Segamat, Johor, to work on an airstrip under construction in Chaah in 1944.
A few weeks later, both brothers were forced to flee Chaah, Johor, after an estate worker informed them of their father’s death due to beriberi disease .
“We walked non-stop back to Gomali Estate for our father’s final rites,” he recalled.
A few months later, their mother also succumbed to the same disease.
“My mother had been ill for some time as there was no food to eat other than tapioca.
“I even rode on the roof of a train with some friends from Batu Anam to Singapore just to pick grains of rice falling from gunny sacks being offloaded from ships to waiting trucks.
“Unfortunately, my mother could not be saved although she managed to eat the rice,” he said.
Just as the brothers were getting used to living life as orphans, Veeramalai was in for another shock when a couple and their children in the estate were killed by communist insurgents.
“The communists decapitated them and placed their severed heads on spikes, apparently because the man had tipped off the British that families in the estate were giving state-issued rice to the communists,” he said.
“To me, people who were born before 1957 who witnessed the atrocities would appreciate Merdeka the most.
“And on that wet morning when I saw thousands of birds being released at Merdeka Stadium on independence day was the happiest day of my life as I truly felt liberated,” said the 79-yearold retired government servant.
“The younger generation may never really know what people my age went through before Merdeka. I pray they never will have to go through the same,” said Veeramalai.